Pakistan can do more with respect to regional security: Pentagon

Washington D.C. [United States], May 19 : In what appeared as the United States' (US) dissatisfaction over Pakistan's efforts to maintain regional security, Washington has highlighted that the country can do more in terms of it.

"We believe that Pakistan can certainly do more with respect to regional security. It can certainly do more with respect to security within Afghanistan, and we would look to them and hope that they would both [Pakistan and Afghanistan] help, because they are both victims of terrorism and they've also sponsored terrorism," Pentagon Chief Spokesperson Dana W. White remarked while addressing a media briefing on Thursday.

"So we look to Pakistan to create more opportunities to secure the region," White added.

The Pentagon Spokesperson also dwelled upon Pakistan's former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's statement on 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, saying, "Again, this is an inflection point for Pakistan. Pakistan has decisions to make, and we hope that they will be a partner in safeguarding the region."

Pentagon's briefing came a few days after the briefing of the US State Department, wherein its spokesperson Heather Nauert had addressed a similar query on Sharif's Mumbai comments, saying that Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) founder and 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Hafiz Saaed is a tremendous concern to Washington.

"We are concerned about the mastermind behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks. And he's a Lashkar-e-Taiba guy who was being held in Pakistan, and he was eventually let out on house arrest, and we have a reward out for. I believe it's for his arrest, not information leading to his arrest, but his arrest. I don't recall off the top of my head the award amount, but that person out in the open is a tremendous concern to the United States," Nauert had said then.

There is an ongoing diplomatic rift between Pakistan and the US as the latter imposed travel restrictions on Pakistani diplomats which have been reciprocated by the former, according to the reports.